


The Life You Left Behind

by BlodkruWrites



Category: The 100 (TV), The 100 Series - Kass Morgan
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst, Bellamy-centric, Character Death, Gen, Hurt Bellamy, Hurt No Comfort, Not A Fix-It, Octavia Blake deserved a better arc, blake siblings, not anti Octavia
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-24
Updated: 2018-10-24
Packaged: 2019-08-06 19:18:47
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,318
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16393616
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BlodkruWrites/pseuds/BlodkruWrites
Summary: "I couldn't tell her I love her."Bellamy had said this one time before. He had never wanted it to be true again. It's too late to say it now.





	The Life You Left Behind

**Author's Note:**

> I was rewatching season 4 of the 100 when I came across the scene in episode 10 where Bellamy and Kane are talking about Octavia. It's when she's going to the Conclave and no one knows if she'll survive. Bellamy says one line "I couldn't tell her I loved her" and it sparked this. Set after season 5.  
> I love Octavia- my favorite character- and this hurt to write.

 

_I couldn’t tell her I love her._

 

Once. Twice. Three times.

Bellamy hangs his head as he looks down at his sister. Her cold, pale, lifeless body. It’s hard to believe she’s an adult now. Was an adult. Bellamy had missed six years of his sister’s life. Seven, if you count when she was in lock up. He should never have left her. Should have stayed by her side all those years ago. But like always, he was thinking with his heart. Not his head. And when he did think with his head, it got her killed.

They found her seemingly asleep in her Cryo chamber. She was one of the last they woke up. Everyone thought it would be better; there were some tensions now that Madi was seen as Commander. Everyone turned on Octavia after once being devout to her. It’s the story the group who conspired to kill Octavia said. These people were part of Wonkru at some point. Or so they said. Bellamy knew some of them were Eligius prisoners who had followed McCreary. He knew they wanted Octavia- Blodreina- dead. Even after being saved from a nuclear death, they were ungrateful.

She had been stabbed multiple times.

One of the conspirators had open her chamber for just minutes. Long enough for them to all take turns driving their blades into her body. Abby had counted twenty-three different wounds. They let her bleed out in her delirious state. She hadn’t even had time to wake up to a new life before they ended it. Abby and Clarke didn’t want to give him the full details; he needed to know.

“She choked on her own blood.” Abby had rushed out. She spoke with clenched fists and couldn’t look him in the eye. “It wasn’t quick. She would have felt everything if it weren’t for the Cryo numbing her.” Clarke had been the one to find her. As much as he had wanted to be the one to wake his sister, Bellamy couldn’t do it. Not after the friction between them. He wanted time to process before speaking to her. When Clarke had come stumbling into the med-bay, tears in her eyes, he had the sinking feeling he wasn’t getting that chance. Clarke had only uttered her name before shoving her way to the trash and throwing up everything in her empty stomach.

Bellamy had dropped right to his knees. He fell to the ground by his sister’s side in shock. She looked like she was asleep. Her eyes shut, the calmest look on her face. She looked like the sister he’d known all his life. So calm. So peaceful. Innocent. He saw the pool of blood around her midsection. It stained her shirt pink and created its own ocean of red around her. There was so much. It looked like it would have spilt over the edge. It soaked his hands as he lifted her up and cradled her head to his chest. It smeared their skin everywhere it touched. He sobbed as he rocked her. Her skin was cold to the touch.

They had tried to drag him away from her. Miller and Murphy. Echo and Clarke had tried to coax him away. He snapped at all four of them, screaming to leave and not touch her. He had even lashed out when Abby had tried to reason with him. Octavia was dead. She wasn’t coming back. He knew that. He knew. It didn’t stop the crashing hurt and grief that consumed him. It didn’t make him feel better. It didn’t bring his sister back. It took Clarke injecting him with a sleep aid to get him to let go of Octavia’s body. She and Murphy had come in together to talk to him. Bellamy had been too distracted to see the syringe in Clarke’s hand. Murphy tried to talk to him, to reach out and touch him. When Bellamy went to shove him away Clarke came from behind. It was the slightest of pricks but it knocked him out in seconds. He could hear her apologizing through her tears as he drifted off.

He wanted all those involved sentenced to death immediately. For once, he didn’t care about civility or peace. He didn’t care that these people were acting under what they thought was good faith. Even Gaia had condemned them. She and Indra stood by his side when he demanded the killers meet the same fate. Everyone was surprised to see them defending Octavia. She had sentenced them to death before; her own death should have been a blessing. It didn’t matter to them. At least, not to Bellamy and Indra. He had lost a sister. She had lost a second, a daughter. Gaia felt sick when she was told the Grounders of the group were using the Commanders as their defense. She refused to accept their penance. Madi had been just as disgusted.

They couldn’t just kill those involved. That was what was said over and over. Abby said it. Diyoza said it. Clarke, Raven, Madi said it. Even Murphy who normally would have been okay with it. “We are the last people to survive Earth. We can’t dwindle the number more.” That was the reasoning. It was what they told Bellamy when he had begged them to tell him who had done it. They had managed to find nineteen of the twenty-three. Bellamy wanted to know who every single one of them was. They had locked him away to keep him from acting out. Echo kept watch on the outside of the door. She heard him scream, cry, beg, and try to break the door down. She tried to keep her ground and not let him out. She nearly caved in at one point. Echo understood his grief. She had lost her own family, had lost Roan. She understood it too well. But she couldn’t let him go on a killing spree. None of them could.

Madi had called for him to be set free. It took three days for them to decide what to do with the murderers.  Octavia’s body had been put into another Cryo chamber- Bellamy’s- till they decided what to do. They would be exiled. Once on the new planet, they would be banished far from the rest of the survivors. Until then, they were held in cells. Once they were all locked away, Bellamy was let free. Madi, Clarke, and Echo were the ones to give him the news. He would never do anything to harm Madi; it was why she was the one to tell him everything. They could all see the anger in his eyes. It was lit with the fury of someone who had just lost their world. Their life. Clarke would later relate it to the look Luna had given her when her whole clan died and she was left. It was the look of someone who had lost everything and was forced to keep living.

It was why they weren’t surprised when they found him a day later in the cell block. His hands were coated in thick red. It dripped onto the once clean ground. Miller and Murphy had been the ones to find him. They were doing patrols when they found him outside of a cell. What did surprise them was the bodies they found. Or lack thereof. He had only killed one person. One man who had been the leader of the traitors. They had all given him up in seconds when Bellamy showed up to the cells. He had been one of McCreary’s men. No one was willing to help him as Bellamy pummeled him to death. He didn’t need a knife like they had used on his sister. Taking the man’s life by his own hands. The other traitors had looked on in shame and terror at the man before them. He had looked at them one by one when he finished with the leader. Hatred and bloodlust flowed freely through him. But he didn’t act on it. Instead, he waited. He waited till Miller and Murphy found him and brought him to Madi. He should have answered for his crime. He should have been banished alongside the other murderers. But he wasn’t. No one could blame him for what he did. He was given pity and told it would be up to him what they did with Octavia’s body.

It should have made him feel better. He would be allowed to live and stay with his friends. He refused to use the term _family_ anymore. He had the others, yes, but his family was gone. Ripped away from him like so many damn times before. He wasn’t sure if it would ever regain the meaning it once had. Now it only meant death. First his mother, now his sister. So many times he had thought Octavia had or would die. He hadn’t been ready then. He would never be.

Ultimately, it did come down to what he wanted to do. Octavia would be buried once they were on the ground. He couldn’t float her body. It was a monstrous thing to do to her. She deserved so much more than that. Bellamy ordered she be kept in Cryo to prevent any decay. She would remain there until she could be buried. No matter what it took, she would get to the ground. He had made that promise to her when she was part of the 100. When she was alive and well and carefree. He would continue that promise now.

He told Clarke of all people this. They were alone in the Cryo room. The last time they had been alone together he had been so hopeful. For himself, his friends, his family, his sister. Now he couldn’t find it in him to care. Eventually, the grief would wear away. He would be able to function and live. For now he allowed himself to wallow and grieve. Who could blame him? They were standing in front of what had been his chamber. Now his sister lay in it. Dead. His dead sister.

“Did I ever tell you why I named my sister ‘Octavia’?” They had been quiet up until this moment.

Clarke looked up at him, hesitant to answer. “The story of Augustus was your favorite. He had a sister named Octavia.” Bellamy nodded. He sniffed and crossed his arms tight against his chest. It was like he was holding himself together.

“Octavia use to ask me to read her that story nearly every night. From the time she could talk till right before she was taken on the Ark.” He had a far away look in his eyes. “Augustus and Octavia had a great uncle. Someone else that was stabbed twenty-three times. Who would have thought my sister would have the same fate?” His jaw clenched. Clarke could nearly feel the grief coming off him. She reached out a hand to comfort him. It stung the slightest when he moved out of the way a little. She wouldn’t hold it against him. “She thought she was doing what was right for her people,” he continued, “whatever it took to keep them alive. Her pride got in the way. She liked the power too much. Just like Octavia and Augustus’ uncle.”

“Julius Caesar.” Clarke barely got the name out. Bellamy nodded. His eyes never left the chamber in front of them. He couldn’t make himself look away from Octavia’s serene face.

“Yeah. Julius Caesar.” Another sniff. “Want to know what Augustus did when his uncle was murdered?” Clarke didn’t. She didn’t want to hear the story. The way Bellamy was telling it made it sound like a horror story instead of a historical one. He didn’t wait for her to reply. “He and others hunted down every single one of the people who stabbed Caesar. Every single one.”

“Bellamy-”

“I’m not Augustus.” He already knew what she was thinking. “I won’t kill everyone who did it. Not now. Once we’re on the ground, they’re banished.” Clarke tried to feel a little relieved. “But if I ever see any of them after we’re on the ground…” He finally looked away from the pod. Tears had built in his eyes. She resisted to urge to wipe them away. He couldn’t look at her completely. “I couldn’t tell her I love her.” She shook her head slightly not understanding. “At the Conclave. I couldn’t look my own sister in the eyes and tell her I loved her. Not when I knew she could die.” There was no mistaking the agony in his voice. “Before Praimfaya. I didn’t tell her. The damn radio cut out before I got a chance to.” His jaw was clenched and Clarke could see his fingernails were digging into his arms. He was trying to keep himself from shattering right there.

“Bellamy, she knew you loved her. I heard you guys talking. She knew.” If those words gave him any ounce of comfort, it didn’t show. Instead, he looked back to the pod. Tears flowed freely now. Little tremors seemed to take him over and his nails only dug in deeper.

“I told her part of me wished part of her was dead.”

“Oh, Bellamy I am so sorry.” She had heard that too. She had been saying goodbye to Madi but had heard everything. She reached out again and this time he let her. It still provided no comfort.

Bellamy placed a single hand onto the chamber’s lid. His tears fell and streaked down it. “I love you, O. I am horrible big brother and couldn’t protect you.” He was freely sobbing. Clarke tried to help keep him up when his knees nearly gave out. “I love you, little sister. I couldn’t say it before and I am so, so sorry.”

He would have given anything to hear her say it back.


End file.
